Tag Archives: Sean Eads

Most anthologies carry a theme, sometimes heavily. A concrete yoke of hackneyed premise across sagging shoulders. I always like the “whatever” sort of collections, which is exactly what Equilibrium Overturned is. Sort of. Most of these tales deal with a bleak sense of survival, the settings change and the details and characters, but every one involves a tenacious attempt to hold the fuck on in a world uncontrolled.

John Everson’s “Amnion” gives us a well-meaning physician and his experiment in regaining youth. Factor in some bad decisions and a haughty wench and we have the makings of a nightmare. JG Faherty shows us a unique sort of zombie apocalypse in “Martial Law.” Rose Blackthorn’s “Through the Ghostlands” is one of my favorites, a stark and sad tale of siblings making their way through a haunted landscape.

“Perfect Soldiers,” by S.G. Larner, shows us a different kind of terror war going on and Martin Slag’s “Wombie” is a surrealist bizarro tale about a veterinarian and the world scale conspiracy of oddity that he uncovers. “No Man’s Land,” by Roger Jackson, gives us a war-nightmare where the dead aren’t lucky enough to remain that way.

Sean Eads’ historical horror show, “The Alamo Incident: From The Chronicles of Timaeus Shields,” must be read to comprehend. Tim Waggoner delivers a gory slice of brutal bizarro in “This Is Not a Horror Story.”

The collection closes with a tale of sadness and loss simply titled “Sunrise.” In this tale by Tony Knighton, we follow a desperate father as he tries to save his ailing son in an unforgiving world. All in all, the stories in Equilibrium Overturned are solid and the thread of desperation and survival is present in almost all of them.

Shock Totem Publications is very happy to announce that our long-awaited fifth issue is available for purchase!

This issue of Shock Totem is yet another eclectic mix of horror fiction and nonfiction, featuring previously unpublished stories from the likes of Ari Marmell, Darrell Schweitzer, Joe Mirabello, Mekenzie Larsen, and others. There is also a five-part illustrated microfiction serial, by Kurt Newton, which is something new for us; plus a conversation with horror legend Jack Ketchum, narrative nonfiction by Nick Contor, reviews and more.

Shock Totem is proud to announce that we will finally be unleashing another great issue of darkly weird fiction!

Our fifth issue was originally scheduled to come out in January, but for reasons which you can read here we made the hard choice to delay it until July. And now with July nearly upon us, that wait, thankfully, is over.

For those who have yet to see it, here is the cover for issue #5:

Another brilliant piece of work from Mikio Murakami, who has done all our magazine artwork since issue #3.

We’re really pleased with how this issue turned out. It’s unlike any of our previous issues, which were themselves unlike previous issues, yet as always it is still clearly Shock Totem. We think you’ll enjoy it.

Look for it next month, in print and digital formats. And if you want to get it out of the way now, you can preorder the issue here.